Tobi
by magewriter
Summary: Tobi comes to the Akatsuki. Rated T for his injuries and Orochimaru. Portrays the Akatsuki from ObitoTobi's perspective and deals with his internal struggle to remember his past, etc. Chapter 2 out now!
1. Dead? Or Alive?

Tobi

By Magewriter

Chapter 1: Dead? Or Alive?

Disclaimer: I own nothing by Masashi Kishimoto. That means that, once he writes in how Obito became the Tobi-chan we know and love, this story will be outdated.

I was writing my County Fair fanfic and I suddenly got inspired to write this…

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It's all over for me; I know it.

One side of me is crushed under a rock; the eye from the other side I have sacrificed to Kakashi. With the Sharingan already activated, it should help him with the mission.

The eye is now outside of my socket; if I die now, at least they'll have a chance. I close the flaps of skin that used to surround my eye. If I somehow live, I don't want my eye socket to become infected.

They cry as they leave. I begin to feel floaty. It feels nice, compared to before… The pain was almost too much to bear.

As I drift into peace, I hear faint voices. Who are they? Both seem to be masculine, one deeper than the other. Am I imagining things? It's certainly possible…

I wake up on a hard table. There is a man with bright red hair next to me. Something tells me that this isn't right. There's something…. sinister about him. I don't know what it is.

My entire right side hurts. Or is it that my left side is numb? I don't know. I can't remember anything… The man next to me stands up. "You've been out for a few days. You're lucky Orochimaru found you; with a little bit of alteration, you should be okay."

"H…" I can't even form the word "who." How pathetic is that? Maybe that "Orochimaru" person should have left me wherever I was.

The man noticed my attempt to speak. "Oh. Don't try to talk. With the right side of your face deformed like that, it probably won't work very well. Luckily, I'm the master of synthetics. I even managed to make myself into a synthetic being."

Suddenly, I'm afraid. Anyone who is willing to do something like that is… well… scary. I cry out, or try to. It doesn't work very well.

He chuckles. "Don't be afraid; once I'm finished working on you, you'll be fine. Should I start with the eyes? You seem to have lost one."

"Mmh?" Maybe I can communicate through tones of voice.

"You lost your left eye. Or didn't you notice? I should have one – two, actually – in about your size. It's always better to make it a little too small rather than too large if you aren't sure."

He opens a drawer in the table I'm sitting on. The curtains are drawn in the window next to me, but only moonlight is filtered in. The room is artificially lit. I realize that this man may be fully capable of making me functional again, but I think that perhaps I don't want to be.

He pulls out a box. "This is the eye box… If you're making puppets, you need proper eyes. I make them so that they assemble and work with different functions." He holds some of the little "eye" spheres up near my face. I close my right eye. The repulsiveness of it all…

He decides on the size, then asks me to open my eye so he can see the color. "Oh, an Uchiha from Konoha! That should come in handy. I'll have to tell Oro."

I have no idea what and Uchiha is, or where Konoha is, or who the heck Oro is. Orochimaru, perhaps? But, something in his voice told me that I'm not like other people…. Is there anyone else here? This "Oro" person seems to be significant, but I don't know when I'm going to meet them, or if I ever will.

"What color should I make your eye…? Brown? Brown would work well. Do you have any objection to brown?"

I shake my head slightly. I can't turn my head to the side, but he's obviously fiddling with the eye that is to be mine. "Okay, here we go… Everything I'm working with is completely sterile, okay? Now, this is going to hurt, but it won't get infected. I want to make sure you know that before I do anything on your face."

I grunt a bit and nod my head.

"Now, I will warn you. This is going to hurt. It's going to hurt a whole lot. And it should keep hurting – not too much mind – for the next few weeks. It takes time for your body to adjust to these things. And I'm really sorry, but I can't use anesthesia because I'm working with your head and it has to do with the way that your brain functions. So, you're going to feel me putting this into your eye socket, and it's okay to scream or whatever else, just please try not to shake your head too much because that would mess up the eye."

I prepared for the worst. I had the instinct to screw my eyes shut, but obviously that wouldn't be a very good idea. I could feel him pull the flaps of skin away from the eye socket, then the synthetic eye being pushed in. He pulled my eyelids shut as I screamed. My eyes were closed, but it did them no good because the pain was actually inside of my left eye. The left side of me curled up into a ball – I had very little control over the right side of my body – and I tried to bite my knuckles in an attempt to transfer the feeing from my eye to my hand, which would get better much faster.

The man, seeing what was happening, removed my hand from my mouth and put a piece of wood into it instead. But, if I couldn't transfer the pain, I had to scream. With the right side of my mouth closed and immobile, it was hard, but I still did. I could feel my eyes watering. I didn't blame my body for wanting to flush out the synthetic.

Once the screaming was over, I was still curled up, still crying. I felt a hand on my shoulder. I didn't open my eyes, but I could feel the person murmuring to me, the vibratons spreading through their arm, into their hand, and onto me.

After awhile, when I had calmed down a bit more, I felt a hand gently stroking the side of my face. I looked up with my right eye to see that it was a woman. Her face was kind, and it comforted my mind if not my eye socket. She smiled a bit as she said soft words to me, and I could begin to distinguish that they were nice words, kind words, as my sobbing slowed.

When I was mostly calm, she turned to the man. "He should be okay. Oro-san will probably be mad at you for waking everyone up at two in the morning. But the boy will be fine. Don't do anything else to him for awhile, though."

"Who's the expert again?"

"I know. But I'm talking about emotional stress, not physical. Don't mess with his mind, okay, Sasori?"

"I know, I know. His body needs time to adjust to something like that. What should I do next?"

"Maybe the face. He seems really sweet… I'd like to know what he's saying. Plus, if he screams again, maybe it won't hurt so much." She bent down next to me. "Are you okay?"

I nod my head a little. I like this woman. She seems realistic, but at the same time she's exactly what I need right now. And it seems like she wants me to be okay. The man seems like he just wants me for one of his projects.

"Okay. Trust me – you'll feel better soon. Sasori's synthetic parts are the best in existence. Maybe it would be better if you got some sleep now. Sasori? Can you give him something to knock him out for awhile?"

"No, I need his brain to function normally so that it can connect to his eye."

"Well," she said, turning back to me, "Just… try to fall asleep, okay?"

"Mmh."

"Okay. G'night, Sasori. I know you're not entirely human, but your consciousness needs to rest too, so you should sleep or turn off or whatever it is you do sometime soon. Little boy, just do your best… I hope you like it here."

I smiled a bit. The man picked me up and I was worried, but then he put me down on a futon. Once the pain in my eye dulled enough, I was able to fall back asleep.

.-..-..-.

When I woke up again, the man wasn't there. I tried to remember what had happened before my last time being conscious – it must have been a long time because I recognized certain objects and had language skills – but I couldn't think of anything.

A man with long, black hair peeked into my room. "Hey, lookit! It's the non-member!"

He seemed to look down on me. I closed my eyes.

"Wow. It looks pretty sucky to have been under that big rock. Bet it hurts really bad."

He had been standing; now, he squatted down next to me. "Nothing personal, but since you're one of Sasori-danna's experiments, I feel compelled to dislike you. Maybe I'll come to like you eventually, but for now, I don't have that great of an opinion of you. I don't really blame you, though – Sasori can fix anyone. You're lucky we have him here, or you'd be in big trouble."

I shut my eyes tighter. With the recent acquisition of a left eye, this made them water, so I loosened up on my eyelids.

"What color did he make your eye? Sky-sama said your right was a Sharingan, but he wouldn't tell me what –"

"Chedo-baka, get out of my room!" I heard the man – Sasori – yell from another room.

"Oops! Gotta go! Maybe I'll see you around!" So hypocritical… first, saying that he didn't like me, then acting as if we were friends.

Sasori entered the room. "That was Chedone. He's annoying, nothing more. Look out for his fire jutsu, though – he's really good at them. He has amazing control over fire. He does a bit with explosives, but mostly he uses fire. It's annoying, though – I use puppets and he uses fire. He seems to be immune to it…"

The woman came down the hall again. "Hey, Sasori! I brought the kid some food and stuff. Can he sit up?"

"Anyone can sit up if they're propped up enough."

She came in holding a plate of food and a cup of water, then sat down nest to me. "Sweetness, do you think you can eat or drink something?" She said "sweetness" not in a flirty way, but rather as a substitute for a name. It's probably what she calls animals, too…

"Mmh!" I nodded.

"Okay. If I'm hurting you, just tell me. I'm going to help you sit up."

She propped me up against the wall – my futon was in a corner – and helped me drink the water. I felt pathetic, needing assistance to eat and drink, but the damage over my mouth felt better because the water made it softer.

"Sasori, you really should work on his face next. He's too cute to be left like this – you can tell from the left side of his face."

"Give his eye time to adjust. I'm not going to do anything else on his head for awhile, either."

"Okay... Hey, sweetness, do you think you can eat rice and fish?"

"Mmh." I don't want to be fed. I pick up the chopsticks with my left hand.

"Oh, no, don't do that. You can't even hold them right. Why not his arm, Sasori?"

"I'll see what needs to be done."

"Okay. You'll have everything back soon, sweetness. Don't worry." She smiled. She seemed sweet.

As she helped me eat, Sasori touched parts of my arm and leg – especially the joints – to figure out what needed repair first.

Finding that no part of my person was in particularly bad shape, except on the outside (which was already bandaged), he kicked the woman – he called her Kiyo – out of the room and closed the sliding paper door. Now, the light filtering through the curtains was more than enough for anything he planned to do to me, as I was back on the table.

"Okay. Now, do you want me to work on your face?"

"Mmh." I nodded my head a bit. It would be nice to be able to speak again.

"Okay," he said, pulling on a pair of latex gloves. "Now, I'm going to have to put my hand in your mouth because that's the best way to tell where your mouth ends, but trust me, I'm just as disturbed by this as you are. This never leaves this room, okay?"

"Mmh." I nodded.

He uncapped a pen and stuck his finger into my mouth. When he found the corner of my mouth, he poked it so that he could see it from the outside and made a mark with his pen. Then, he wet a piece of cloth and put it over my mouth, to soften the scabbing there I guessed.

"Okay. Let's let that soak in… It's been really interesting having you in here. This has been the first time I've ever worked with a live human subject beside myself."

Oh. Great.

After a few minutes, he took the wet cloth off of my mouth and put a thick, black cloth over my eyes. "This shouldn't hurt, at least not much. If it does, tell me. You'd only get freaked out if you saw what I was doing."

Fun.

I could feel him doing something with the scabbing over my mouth. Then, the wet cloth came back. It was directly on top of my lips, which meant that he had gotten all the way through on all of the scabbing over my mouth.

"Okay. Now, this part might hurt a bit. Feel free to scream or do whatever it is you do. Your lips are pretty stuck together at this point. I'm going to put on the local now. Don't lick it, okay? Once your mouth starts to feel fuzzy, _then_ you can lick it. It's amazing stuff – it feels awesome."

I felt him swab some kind of liquid inside of my mouth. Over the next couple of minutes, that part of my mouth became completely numb. It was an odd feeling.

"Feel it yet?"

I nodded.

"Good." He had put the wet cloth back over my mouth; I could only guess what would happen next. My lips had been stuck together for at least a day; now, he was about to force them apart.

I shut my eyes. Tightly.

"Wait, do you want me to do this slowly or quickly? Say something if you want me to do it slowly." No response. "Say something if you want me to do this quickly." I grunted. "Okay, then…" He yanked my lips apart. My left hand flew to my mouth as I muffled a scream and my eyes began to tear up.

"It's okay. Say whatever you want. Everyone's awake now, and since they all know what I'm doing, you can scream if you want to."

I licked my lips. It felt strange, after this long. I also explored the area around my mouth. The left side was mostly normal; the right side was bumpy, perhaps a bit jagged. What had happened before I woke up?

I tried speaking.

"Oh, you're ambitious. Well, don't be too disappointed if talking doesn't work the first time; it takes time to readjust. Your face is messed up, too, which would definitely make it harder…"

It was, in fact, true. My mouth wouldn't move correctly. It was a disappointment, but I could tell that I would be able to get used to it.

"If you're interested, I found you some clean clothes. Those ones have a bunch of blood on them… Those goggles you used to wear were stained, too. I have them, if you want, but they're ugly now." He searched in one of his drawers for a few seconds, then produced a hideous, blood-stained pair of goggles. However, I felt that they were important somehow, perhaps familiar even, so I grabbed for them.

"Thank you, Sasori-san." My speech was sloppy at best, but he seemed to understand.

"I figured you'd want them. Say, do you have a name?"

"I… I don't remember. I don't remember anything…"

"Really? That's too bad. Can you remember any of the syllables?"

"There was an 'o'… No, a 'to'… and a 'bi.' I… I think there were three syllables, but it could just be my imagination."

"Bito? Bitobi? Tobito? Totobi? Oh! I know! You must have been Tobi!"

"It sounds… familiar…"

"Okay. Well, whatever you were before, you seem to be Tobi now, so that's who you'll be. You honestly can't remember anything?"

"No, nothing…. Nothing at all…"

"Too bad. Ah, well. You shouldn't need your memory here, as long as you have decent skills… what can you do, anyway?"

"So far, I talk."

"And you crack jokes. Well, let's just see what Oro do with you once he gets his hands on you."

"Oro?"

"Yeah, remember? Orochimaru? He's the one who saved you. He looks sort of weird, though – he's half snake, so he has almost-white skin and purple marks on his face, and his eyes have vertically slitted pupils. And he has a really long tongue. Not all of us look as normal as Kiyo, Chedo, and myself."

"Um… what should I be prepared for?"

"Well, Orochimaru's tongue can be very long sometimes, so look out for that – he's gay, too – and Kisame is part shark, so he has blue skin and gills. Kakuzu is very loosely sewn together, has five hearts, and is… well, sort of creepy, but he's been living for over a century so we all respect him. Rei isn't very social, so you probably won't see him very much. We still need a bunch of other members – we only have six."

"Um… okay…"

"Don't worry. You'll get used to it eventually."

"How long is 'eventually'?"

"I don't know. It depends on you."

"Wait a minute – how many girls are there?"

"Oh, so he's a pervert, now, is he?"

"No. I was just thinking – is Kiyo the only girl here?"

"Oh, don't worry about her. She more than makes up for that. A tip for staying… uh… normal: don't cross Kiyo. She gets demonic when she's mad and trust me, when she's mad, she will not hesitate to kick you."

"You mean…?"

"Yes. As I said, she's dangerous. Once, she –"

"Oh, you mean the time with Chedo? That was hilarious! I mean, he was writhing in pain, but the rest of you…! Oh, man, you should have seen their faces, luvvy, it was hilarious!" Kiyo had pushed the door open about half a meter and was now leaning on the door frame.

"His name is Tobi now."

"Oh? It suits him. 'Tobi.' You sure that was his name before?"

"Close enough."

"Well, I'll tell everyone. They've been calling you some pretty nasty names out there, Tobi."

"I can imagine."

"Not unless you know us, you don't. Did you tell him about us, Sasori?"

"Not yet."

"Okay. Tobi, there's something you need to know. Every person in this house – apart from you, of course – is an S-rank villain. We kill, injure, all that stuff, to achieve our goal of someday ruling the world. We're the freaks and the emo-kids – heck, with Oro as our leader, how could we not be weird?"

"Who _is_ Orochimaru? You haven't told me very much about him!"

Her expression changed and she began to speak in a very manner-of-fact manner, as if she had been through this several times before. "Orochimaru is the leader of our organization – we call it the 'Akatsuki' – and he's part snake. He once did a forbidden jutsu, so now he can transfer his consciousness from one body to another. He's also sorta pervy – Chedo told me about some abuse he took once – so look out for him. And his tongue. It can stretch meters long and he has the ability to pick people up with it. And, I wouldn't argue with him if I were you because he's powerful enough to lead the Akatsuki."

"I'm afraid of this place now…"

"It's okay; he shouldn't be too interested in you. Unless he's one of those people who's into mismatched eyes… You shouldn't have any problems until your face heals, though."

"You don't have to be so mean…"

"I'm an S-class murderer, Tobi; I don't have to be nice."

"True."

.-..-..-.

Today, Sasori gave me a mask, gloves, and a long-sleeved shirt with a face mask to hide my scars. My right ankle still hurts a bit, and my knee, but I can walk. Kiyo helps me a lot. She gets me breakfast.

The great thing about hands is that they recover from everything quickly. I can hold chopsticks now, even if I'm not that good.

I've met Orochimaru. He scares me. He seems to think of me as some sort of toy. What sort, I'm not so sure I want to know.

Chedo is nice. Even if he doesn't like Sasori, he still seems like a nice person. He and Kiyo seem to spend a lot of time together.

At breakfast, I asked if there was a place where I could stay. Orochimaru said that I was staying in Sasori's room until I was okay. No one would tell me anything more about it. So, I hobbled back to Sasori's room. He wasn't there because he was eating breakfast.

.-..-..-.

That morning, Sasori did nothing to me. I think that it's assumed, at this point, that my left eye hurts. My body is beginning to adjust to it, though – I can see shadows through it, and a little bit of the bright red on Sasori's cloak. He says that it will only get better. Since no part of me is hurt anymore, except on the outside (my skin was hurt badly enough to make up for it) I should be in Orochimaru's care soon. Just the thought of that is frightening.

I can't remember anything! It's so frustrating! Even if I don't supposedly need it, I still want to know what happened before.

I'm living with Sasori until my eye works properly. He made it, so he's the only one who can make adjustments to it. I saw some of his puppets recently, though, and I'm afraid now.

When he noticed my horrible limp a couple of days ago, he asked if I wanted anything in my leg replaced (it would be done under anesthetic, of course) but I told him no, the only reason why I would want medical help would be if I had broken something, and my only problem is that the outside of my leg generally hurts.

Sasori still scares me a bit. He seems a little too willing to make me into a puppet like himself.

If he did, would he be able to control me? Would he give me my personality back after he was done or just kill me?

At this point, Sasori seems to be the biggest threat.

.-..-..-.

It's been about two weeks and – just like Sasori said – my eye still hurts. I hardly ever feel it, though. I think it's attached to my eye socket. I can see pretty well through it, too – I can even read through it, which means that I'm pretty much ready to go to Orochimaru.

Also, all the scabbing on my face and body has healed. It isn't what I wanted, though! Now, the entire right side of my body is scarred! Kiyo says that I was "cute" before, but now I'm ugly.

I told Kiyo this.

"Really? Could I see your face then? Please?"

"Um… I don't want to."

She smiled. "If you're worried that I'll laugh or shrink back or make fun of you in any way, you're wrong. I wouldn't do that to someone. I'm not going to make you, but I really do want to see you."

"Why?"

"Because it's you. Before, you weren't the same person who you are now. It would be nice to know what the new Tobi looks like."

I thought about it. She had seen my scarred, ugly face and the marks on my arm and leg. And hadn't she always been kind to me?

I took off my mask.

"Now, do you want my opinion, Oro's opinion, or the general female population's opinion?"

"Which one is worst?"

"The women of the world."

"That one."

"You're ugly. You might be sort of cute, but the scars just… no. You want Oro next? That one's always important."

"Sure."

"I love the eyes, and you're cute, but the scars haven't gone away yet. Now do you want my opinion?"

"Okay."

"After hearing all that, our sweet little Tobi needs a hug." She hugged me. It was a nice, friendly hug. "Tobi will always be adorable. When you live with freaks for long enough, it starts to matter a little more who someone is rather than what they look like. I'll be there for you, Tobi."

"Thank you, Kiyo-san!"

We came out of the hug. "Now, to guess your age. You seem to be about… oh, twelve or thirteen. Which do you want to be?"

"I'll be twelve."

"Okay. Tobi is now twelve! You should probably go to Orochimaru soon – he's been waiting for you for half a month."

"But… You told me…"

"Do you honestly want him to be mad at you for avoiding him?"

"No, but I –"

"Then don't worry about it. He probably won't be attracted to someone wearing a mask anyway."

"Really?"

"Of course. Would you like a girl wearing a mask?"

"No…"

"Okay, then. I'll show you where his room is, okay? Follow me!"

We went to the lower level of the house, where I had never been before in my two weeks here. I followed her down the stairs and directly to the right was Orochimaru's room.

"Sky-sama, I have Tobi here. Should I bring him in?"

"Please."

She slid opened the door and nudged me inside. Orochimaru's room was… interesting. It was stiflingly hot because of a large heat lamp in one corner. The entire room was reddened by the lamp.

"Okay, Sky-sama, Tobi is yours now. Remember, he's not part snake like you. He can't stay in here for too long or his body overheats."

"Okay."

Kiyo left us, then. Orochimaru showed me to an adjoined room with a window to the outside that would let in fresh air. It was to be mine, but first I had to drag my futon downstairs because he certainly wasn't going to.

Orochimaru's entire room smells like snake. My window is going to be open for the next few days at least to get out the stench, but it will probably take a long time considering that he doesn't have any problem with the smell.

Today, I was tested against the other Akatsuki members to see how good of a fighter I am. I wasn't even stronger than Chedo, and he's supposed to be the weakest of them. I watched a sparring match between Kiyo and Rei-san. It went on for a long time, and it was amazing! Rei-san seems to throw a lot of attacks, but most of Kiyo's technique is to dodge until she gets a good opportunity. Once this happened, she was able to throw Rei-san across the yard, where he broke the wooden fence partway through. As I said, it was amazing… I guess, the more advanced two ninjas are, the longer they can keep going. Neither were tired at the end, either – Rei-san just had a hurt head.

How can I ever hope to be that good?

When I came back to Orochimaru's room, he was shedding his skin. He says that that doesn't mean that he's going to get bigger, it's just something that happens to him. He had me peel the skin off of his back.

I washed my hands several times afterwards and went to the kitchen to have lunch.

.-..-..-.

It's been a few months and I'm used to living with the Akatsuki, even Orochimaru. Mostly, I stay in my room, but I train every day to be a better ninja. Kiyo is helping me. She's amazingly patient.

You might think that living with S-class criminals would be a negative experience, but it actually doesn't seem to be. I'm still chunin-level, but with a lot of work, maybe I can make it up to their level.

.-..-..-.

Orochimaru has left. Rei-sama has taken his place.

The things that Orochimaru did to me while I was here are too horrendous to speak of in T-rated stories.

There is another pair of members sharing one body. They're called Zetsu and they're part venus flytrap.

The first thing Zetsu did after Orochimaru left was turn off the heat lamp, open their room's door, my door, my window, and the front door, and air out the room. It took three days. It might have taken two, but the front door was closed at night.

The next thing Zetsu did was turn on the heat lamp and place a bowl of water under it. The room is extremely humid, but at least it isn't suffocating anymore. Zetsu actually breathe out oxygen, like plants do, so their room smells nice.

After they had gotten their room the way that they wanted, they sent me to town. The best way to get to town is to go to the (relatively) nearby train station. My goal was to get MiracleGro, Zetsu's favored brand of plant food.

When I got back, they put a few drops in a glass of water, sprinkled in some dirt to make weak mud, and drank it. Then they offered it to me! I refused it as politely as I could.

Their futon actually has dirt on it. As they sleep, they take in nutrients from it like a plant. Every once-in-awhile, they sprinkle a little bit of MiracleGro on it to make it nicer.

They also eat humans. That scares me.

.-..-..-.

It's been about thirteen years since I came here and nothing much has changed. The Akatsuki is almost full now, though. Kiyo and Chedo are no longer with us. However, we have new members: Hidan, who doesn't die of injury or blood loss and seldom wears a shirt; Deidara, who blows things up with clay and is Sasori's new partner (he used to work with Orochimaru) and acts a lot like Chedo; and Nameless (also called "White" because of the symbol on his ring) who is extremely mysterious, very threatening, and possibly even more gay than Orochimaru. He scares me sometimes just as badly as Orochimaru used to.

I don't know why I didn't chronicle the others coming, but maybe it's because today, the Akatsuki became full. I was almost as powerful as them, then this new member had to come and steal my dreams of becoming an Akatsuki member.

Itachi is an Uchiha. The name sounds familiar, but only vaguely. He comes from Konoha, the leaf village. He claims that he killed everyone in the Uchiha clan. He has emotional issues.

Most of the time, except when he wants food, Itachi stays in his room. He doesn't turn the light on too much. He has a very precise manner, though, and he has really nice, long, black hair. His eyes are red, too, just like my right one, but Deidara told me not to say that to him. I wonder why.

Sasori made me a new mask that I really like. It's bright orange and it has two eyeholes, with orange mesh over the left eye and black mesh over the right. Also, there's a swirly pattern on it, centered over the right eye. Attached to the solid part of the mask is a wide, black band that goes around my head and down my neck so that no one can see my scars. They've faded, but they're still there. They're more healed on my body, but I still wear my long-sleeved shirt and gloves. No one seems to question it.

Itachi has the tenth ring. I will probably stay a servant to the Akatsuki for a long time. It's fun, though; the members are all relatively nice, if a bit violent, so I don't mind being Zetsu's servant. I've gotten over my fear of them by now.

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Originally, it was Sasori, then I realized that he probably wasn't there thirteen years ago, so I created a character named Masaido, then I was on the phone with Pocky-machine and she told me that he actually was! …Anyway, about a week ago (it's June fourth right now) the anime freaks in my group were talking about Tobi and how he could have been saved, and we decided that Sasori must have had some sort of involvement.

It seems like Sasori goes a bit too fast in the beginning, inserting the new eye when Obito has only known him for a few seconds… Well, it was something that had to be done.

Who could live in the same house as Sasori and not have two eyes? That's the justification for the orange mesh: people think he has a blind spot on his left side but he DOESN'T!!!!

Should this be a oneshot?


	2. Sasori

Tobi

By Magewriter

Chapter 2: Sasori

Disclaimer: All characters and places in this story belong to Masashi Kishimoto.

Well, everyone who reviewed thought this was a great story (which means that it's half-plausible and doesn't have too many typos) so special thanks to everyone who reviewed. As the chapter title says, this is from Sasori's perspective. There will be some of the same dialogue and actions, but some things will be different because it's a different person.

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Orochimaru had dragged me all the way to Konoha. I wonder why. He says it's because it's nice to see his hometown every once-in-awhile.

Who denounces their village when they still want to be there sometimes?

He spent awhile tracking people with his binoculars, telling me about which Konoha boys were cutest. I couldn't care less.

Walking back, there was a landslide. We decided to walk around it since we had plenty of time to spend getting back to the Akatsuki base.

Partway around the pile of rubble, we heard crying. Children, two of them. There was a soft voice, too.

Coming closer, we saw that there was a girl and two boys, but one of them was crushed under a rock. There would be no point in attacking them.

The girl did an eye transplant. I wasn't close enough to know why. Then she and the boy with the light grey hair left.

"Should we save him, Sasori?"

"Why?"

"He looks so helpless… Let's save him."

"He could become a nuisance."

"If he's annoying, we can just make him forget us and send him back. Or we could kill him. It would be good practice with your synthetics, too – it doesn't look like the girl gave him a left eye after she took it out."

It wouldn't be worthwhile if not for that; I'm always trying to improve my synthetic parts, especially with humans. Puppets just aren't the same…

We shoved the rock off of him. His left side was bloody, but then, it had been crushed by the giant rock that had landed on top of him. He was unconscious by the time we got there. Orochimaru gave him a little bit of chakra to keep him alive and we took him back to the Akatsuki base.

"Kakuzu! Kiyo! Chedo! Rei! …We brought someone home with us!"

Kiyo came bounding down to the front door, Chedo following close behind. "Orochimaru! Sasori! We weren't expecting you home for a few more hours! Oh, my gosh! What did you do to that cute little boy?!"

"If we had done this to him, do you think we would have let him live? He's going to be one of Sasori's experiments."

"Sasori? Are you going to hurt him, Sasori? …Because then I would have to hurt you."

"I'm going to give him a left eye and make any other necessary repairs. If things don't work out so well, who knows? If he dies, I could cut him up and test my poisons on him, but I doubt that he's going to die."

She hit me on the head with that stupid granite stick of hers. "If you can't honor the dead or the near-dead, I don't think you have the right to kill!"

"It would be honoring him. He would be fulfilling his duty to me as an experiment piece and be useful even after he was alive."

"How can you be so heartless?"

"I took it out when I made myself into a puppet and gave it to Kakuzu. Now I have rechargeable batteries."

Kiyo glared at me and ran back up the stairs. Orochimaru handed the boy to me and I took him upstairs. I bandaged some of him, but it's hard to work with someone who can't even sit up on their own.

I had dinner with the Akatsuki and went back to my room. It occurred to me that Rei hadn't come out of his room at all. He was here before me, so by the time I got here, he had claimed the attic for his room.

I stayed up reading a new book I had gotten, written by one of Orochimaru's former teammates from Konoha. It included several off-color jokes, and it was generally in bad taste, but it was actually pretty funny. Then, the boy woke up. I could tell because he moved a bit.

"You've been out for a few days. You're lucky Orochimaru found you; with a little bit of alteration, you should be okay."

He opened the left side of his mouth. Some of his blood had dried over the right side, but I wasn't going to mess with that just yet. "Hhh.."

"Oh. Don't try to talk. With the right side of your face deformed like that, it probably won't work very well. Luckily, I'm the master of synthetics. I even managed to make myself into a synthetic being."

His right eye shuts tighter and he yells, "Mmmph!!!" He seems to be afraid of me for some reason.

I laughed. "Don't be afraid; once I'm finished working on you, you'll be fine. Should I start with the eyes? You seem to have lost one."

"Mmh?" He's intelligent; using tones to communicate wouldn't occur to just anyone.

"You lost your left eye. Or didn't you notice? I should have one – two, actually – in about your size. It's always better to make it a little too small rather than too large if you aren't sure." If it's too big, your eye socket has to stretch. If the eye is a little loose, at least the tissue around the eye can fill in the gaps.

I opened the drawer of small things, such as eyes, small joints, teeth, and nails. Puppets are so easy to make when everything fits together… I take out the eye box and turn on a lamp so that I can see better. Suddenly, I realize that I should probably explain all of this to the boy. "This is the eye box… If you're making puppets, you need proper eyes. I make them so that they assemble and work with different functions." I have slitted pupils, like Oro's, square pupils, like a goat's, and round pupils. Pupils and irises are made in different sizes and are flexible enough to fit directly onto the eye. I also have nets that imitate rods and cones.

I rub some hand sanitizer onto my hands and hold up several eyeball bases, finally deciding that his eyes are size 8. I ask him to open his right eye so that I can match up the color.

It's a sharingan.

"Oh, an Uchiha from Konoha! That should come in handy. I'll have to tell Oro."

"What color should I make your eye…? Brown? Brown would work well. Do you have any objection to brown?"

He shook his head. It was barely noticeable, but he did it. I attach the human-level rod-and-cone net, a brown iris, and a human-sized, round pupil. "Okay, here we go… Everything I'm working with is completely sterile, okay? Now, this is going to hurt, but it won't get infected. I want to make sure you know that before I do anything on your face."

He grunted a bit.

"Now, I will warn you. This is going to hurt. It's going to hurt a whole lot. And it should keep hurting – not too much mind – for the next few weeks. It takes time for your body to adjust to these things. And I'm really sorry, but I can't use anesthesia because I'm working with your head and it has to do with the way that your brain functions. So, you're going to feel me putting this into your eye socket, and it's okay to scream or whatever else, just please try not to shake your head too much because that would mess up the eye."

I carefully opened his eyelids, then pushed the eyeball in. As I closed the lids, he screamed. I knew that his eyes would start to tear up in a few seconds; if they didn't, there would be strong. Tears are the body's way to get rid of impurities, such as dust, dirt, or a large foreign body the size of an eyeball. They also express pain, either mental or physical. The boy was definitely in a large amount of physical pain.

His left side, meanwhile, curled as much into a ball as it could. Then he started biting his left knuckle to try to focus on another part of himself that was in pain.

I couldn't let him do that. As he was my project, I didn't want him to be damaged any more than he had to be.

I put a block of wood in his mouth instead.

After I did this, he started to sob very loudly. Everyone would have been awake at that point, so this would only keep them up.

My door opened and Kiyo ran in. Trust her to care enough to come in here… she put her hand on his shoulder, murmuring to him. As he calmed, I could hear the pet names she called him.

Finally, he was okay. Well, not entirely okay – his eye socket was probably stinging horribly – but he wasn't sobbing like before and I would be able to read my book in peace.

Kiyo looked up at me. "He should be okay. Oro-san will probably be mad at you for waking everyone up at two in the morning. But the boy will be fine. Don't do anything else to him for awhile, though."

"Who's the expert again?" I felt insulted.

"I know. But I'm talking about emotional stress, not physical. Don't mess with his mind, okay, Sasori?"

"I know, I know. His body needs time to adjust to something like that. What should I do next?"

"Maybe the face. He seems really sweet… I'd like to know what he's saying. Plus, if he screams again, maybe it won't hurt so much." She bent down so that she was closer to the boy. "Are you okay?"

He nodded slightly and I'm pretty sure I saw him smile a bit.

Kiyo smiled. "Okay. Trust me – you'll feel better soon. Sasori's synthetic parts are the best in existence. Maybe it would be better if you got some sleep now. Sasori? Can you give him something to knock him out for awhile?"

"No, I need his brain to function normally so that it can connect to his eye."

She faced the boy again. "Well, just… try to fall asleep, okay?"

"Mmh."

"Okay. G'night, Sasori. I know you're not entirely human, but your consciousness needs to rest too, so you should sleep or turn off or whatever it is you do sometime soon. Little boy, just do your best… I hope you like it here."

He smiled again. His eyes were still teary, but he didn't seem too upset. I picked him up and he looked startled, but he relaxed again when I put him down on the futon I had dragged down the hallway for him earlier that day. He fell asleep sometime before three, when I decided to shut down for a few hours. I plugged myself into the wall so that my batteries could power up. I tend to not work very well if I'm functioning while I recharge.

.-..-..-.

The next morning, I got up and had some rice with something left over from the night before. I never function very well after a recharge session; my body needs to get used to being active again. Fortunately, Orochimaru checks on me every morning to see if I've turned myself off. He knows how to turn me back on.

As I walked back to my room, I heard Chedo's voice coming from inside. Stupid fire-elemental, thinking that just because he can make a few good sparks, he can go into my room whenever he wants…

"Chedo, get out of my room!"

He scurried out of my room. He glanced at me as he passed, then locked himself into his room. I heard the latch as I walked into my room.

"That was Chedone. He's annoying, nothing more. Look out for his fire jutsu, though – he's really good at them. He has amazing control over fire. He does a bit with explosives, but mostly he uses fire. It's annoying, though – I use puppets and he uses fire. He seems to be immune to it…" Stupid fire-elemental, always singing my puppets…

There is a universal rule that, when one annoying thing happens, more annoying things are going to happen until you can't stand it anymore. In this case, Kiyo came. "Hey, Sasori! I brought the kid some food and stuff. Can he sit up?"

"Anyone can sit up if they're propped up enough." You brought the food, now get out of my room.

Of course, she's long since taught herself to ignore me when I'm mad at her. She crouched next to the boy. "Sweetness, do you think you can eat or drink something?" What is it with her and pet names?

"Mmh!" His head bobbed up and down a bit.

"Okay. If I'm hurting you, just tell me. I'm going to help you sit up."

She propped him against the wall and tipped the water into his mouth. He looked content, which was surprising considering that he was completely helpless.

She looked up at me in that cutesy manner of hers. It's so stupid, acting like a little kid. She can't seem to comprehend that it doesn't affect me. "Sasori, you really should work on his face next. He's too cute to be left like this – you can tell from the left side of his face." She turned around, probably smiling at the boy.

"Give his eye time to adjust. I'm not going to do anything else on his head for awhile, either."

"Okay... Hey, sweetness, do you think you can eat rice and fish?"

"Mmh." He tried to pick up his chopsticks with his left hand.

"Oh, no, don't do that. You can't even hold them right. Why not his arm, Sasori?"

"I'll see what needs to be done." Now, feed him or get out of my room.

"Okay. You'll have everything back soon, sweetness. Don't worry."

As she fed him the rice and fish that she had brought, I inspected the left side of his body for breaks and other problems beside scarring. By the time he was done eating, I had found that no part of him had any really bad damage; he would be able to heal relatively easily. I kicked Kiyo out.

Now, I picked him up and put him back on my worktable. "Okay. Now, do you want me to work on your face?"

"Mmh." He nodded.

I wasn't that happy, but I knew that it had to be done sometime. I got a pair of latex gloves from my safety equipment drawer. "Okay. Now, I'm going to have to put my hand in your mouth because that's the best way to tell where your mouth ends, but trust me, I'm just as disturbed by this as you are. This never leaves this room, okay?"

"Mmh." He nodded. Well, he wouldn't be talking correctly for awhile, anyway…

I got a permanent marker and uncapped it. I stuck my latex-coated finger into his mouth, found the edge of it, poked it out, and marked it. Then I got my hand the heck out of there.

I got a piece of cloth from my cloth shelf and wet it. I put it over the scabbing on his mouth. "Okay. Let's let that soak in… It's been really interesting having you in here. This has been the first time I've ever worked with a live human subject beside myself." He gave me a death glare. I smiled. It was funny.

After I judged that the scabbing had softened enough that I wouldn't hurt him by chipping it away, I took it off of his mouth (it had absorbed a bit of dried blood, but not a significant amount) and covered his eyes with a dark, thick piece of cloth that I folded over a few times. If he knew I was going to use a scalpel on his face, he would probably panic. "This shouldn't hurt, at least not much. If it does, tell me. You'd only get freaked out if you saw what I was doing."

I knew that he was glaring at me through the cloth, so I smiled mirthfully as I chipped away at the dried blood over his mouth. When I got down to the skin, I took the wet cloth, cleaned up the flakes of dried blood that had fallen onto his mouth, and put it back to soften the skin there. There was no reason not to make this particular procedure more painful than it had to be.

I shuffled around in my chemical drawer. Way in the back was a local anesthetic. All of the containers were completely airtight so that evaporated bits of poison wouldn't make the other Akatsuki members sick, so the local was perfectly good for use on humans.

"Okay. Now, this part might hurt a bit. Feel free to scream or do whatever it is you do. Your lips are pretty stuck together at this point. I'm going to put on the local now. Don't lick it, okay? Once your mouth starts to feel fuzzy, _then_ you can lick it. It's amazing stuff – it feels awesome." I remember that from when I was human… some things from back then were actually pretty nice.

I waited a few minutes, making it through two pages of my book.

"Feel it yet?"

He nodded. He still isn't too good at controlling his head, but on the positive side, he can only get better.

"Good." The black cloth was still over his head. I took two pairs of very large, blunt-ended pliars, then remembered that I should ask him how he wanted it done.

"Wait, do you want me to do this slowly or quickly?" I suddenly realized that he was unable to talk. "Say something if you want me to do it slowly." No response. "Say something if you want me to do this quickly." He grunted. "Okay, then…" I took the pliars, grasped his lips firmly, and pulled.

His left hand went straight to his mouth and he muffled a scream.

"It's okay. Say whatever you want. Everyone's awake now, and since they all know what I'm doing, you can scream if you want to."

He tried to talk, but he had very loose control of his mouth, if any.

"Oh, you're ambitious. Well, don't be too disappointed if talking doesn't work the first time; it takes time to readjust. Your face is messed up, too, which would definitely make it harder. If you're interested, I found you some clean clothes. Those ones have a bunch of blood on them… Those goggles you used to wear were stained, too. I have them, if you want, but they're ugly now." I produced them from my everything-drawer. He looked confused, but he took them

"Thank you, Sasori-san." At least, I think that's what he said. His speech is horribly slurred.

"I figured you'd want them. Say, do you have a name?" Then I wouldn't have to refer to you as "the little boy."

"I… I don't remember. I don't remember anything…"

"Really? That's too bad. Can you remember any of the syllables?"

"There was an 'o'… No, a 'to'… and a 'bi.' I… I think there were three syllables, but it could just be my imagination."

"Bito? Bitobi? Tobito? Totobi? Oh! I know! You must have been Tobi!"

"It sounds… familiar…"

"Okay. Well, whatever you were before, you seem to be Tobi now, so that's who you'll be. You honestly can't remember anything?"

"No, nothing…. Nothing at all…"

"Too bad. Ah, well. You shouldn't need your memory here, as long as you have decent skills… what can you do, anyway?"

"So far, I talk."

"And you crack jokes. Well, let's just see what Oro do with you once he gets his hands on you."

"Oro?"

"Yeah, remember? Orochimaru? He's the one who saved you. He looks sort of weird, though – he's half snake, so he has almost-white skin and purple marks on his face, and his eyes have vertically slitted pupils. And he has a really long tongue. Not all of us look as normal as Kiyo, Chedo, and myself."

"Um… what should I be prepared for?"

"Well, Orochimaru's tongue can be very long sometimes, so look out for that – he's gay, too – and Kisame is part shark, so he has blue skin and gills. Kakuzu is very loosely sewn together, has five hearts, and is… well, sort of creepy, but he's been living for over a century so we all respect him. Rei isn't very social, so you probably won't see him much. We still need a bunch of other members – we only have six."

"Um… okay…"

"Don't worry. You'll get used to it eventually."

"How long is 'eventually'?"

"I don't know. It depends on you."

"Wait a minute – how many girls are there?" What kind of question is that? He sounds like the author of the book I'm reading!

"Oh, so he's a pervert, now, is he?"

"No. I was just thinking – is Kiyo the only girl here?"

"Oh, don't worry about her. She more than makes up for that. A tip for staying… uh… normal: don't cross Kiyo. She gets demonic when she's mad and trust me, when she's mad, she will not hesitate to kick you."

"You mean…?"

"Yes. As I said, she's dangerous. Once, she –"

My door was mercilessly flung open and Kiyo stood in it, smiling evilly. "Oh, you mean the time with Chedo? That was hilarious! I mean, he was writhing in pain, but the rest of you…! Oh, man, you should have seen their faces, luvvy, it was hilarious!"

"His name is Tobi now."

"Oh? It suits him. 'Tobi.' You sure that was his name before?"

"Close enough." Get the heck out of my room, Kiyo.

"Well, I'll tell everyone. They've been calling you some pretty nasty names out there, Tobi."

"I can imagine."

"Not unless you know us, you don't. Did you tell him about us, Sasori?"

"Not yet."

"Okay. Tobi, there's something you need to know. Every person in this house – apart from you, of course – is an S-rank villain. We kill, injure, all that stuff, to achieve our goal of someday ruling the world. We're the freaks and the emo-kids – heck, with Oro as our leader, how could we not be weird?"

"Who _is_ Orochimaru? You haven't told me very much about him!"

Her expression changed and she began to speak in a very manner-of-fact manner, as if she had been through this several times before. "Orochimaru is the leader of our organization – we call it the 'Akatsuki' – and he's part snake. He once did a forbidden jutsu, so now he can transfer his consciousness from one body to another. He's also sorta pervy – Chedo told me about some abuse he took once – so look out for him. And his tongue. It can stretch meters long and he has the ability to pick people up with it. And, I wouldn't argue with him if I were you because he's powerful enough to lead the Akatsuki."

"I'm afraid of this place now…"

"It's okay; he shouldn't be too interested in you. Unless he's one of those people who's into mismatched eyes… You shouldn't have any problems until your face heals, though."

"You don't have to be so mean…"

"I'm an S-class murderer, Tobi; I don't have to be nice."

"True."

"Kiyo, get out of my room. Who told you could come in in the first place?"

"No one. But I can tell when you're talking about me."

"No, you can't. That just means that you were practicing genjutsu in the hall and hoping that someone would help you with it because everyone knows you're hopeless with illusions and you happened to overhear us talking."

"Yeah. But it still means I was on this floor, which means that I knew something was going to happen up here."

"No, it means you wanted Chedo or Rei to help you because only Oro and Kakuzu are downstairs and Oro doesn't care about you because you're a woman."

"Shut up! At least I'm never going to be abused by him. You know women are better, anyway."

"It depends on your point of view. Now, get out of my room."

She glared at me in that unsustainably angry way that she has, but didn't close my door, so I had to do that.

.-..-..-.

I've been working on a mask with Tobi. I put mesh in front of the eyes so that, if anyone should have a grudge against Uchihas, he'll be okay. Other than that, it's just a plain wooden mask, painted black and red, with strips of cloth around the back of the head. He seemed really happy when I gave it to him, along with a long-sleeved shirt and a pair of gloves.

Tobi's scars have been healing very nicely. Of course, he's very heavily scarred, but he can use chopsticks again. He isn't very good with them, but then, his arm hasn't completely healed yet.

Today, he told me what he thought of Orochimaru. He's afraid of sky-sama, which isn't good because, technically, he's Orochimaru's servant, to do with as he wills.

Also, he can see color through his left eye. He saw the red on the inside of my Akatsuki cloak. Considering that he's only had the synthetic in for a few days, that's wonderful. He should be able to see relatively well in not-too-long.

.-..-..-.

It's been two weeks since Tobi got his synthetic eye in, he can read normal text through it, and his scabs are healed. Today, he goes to Orochimaru. I signaled this to him by putting his futon outside of my room while he was eating lunch. I ignored him when he asked me why. He isn't in my care anymore, so why should I give him more than the necessary amount of attention.

I feel sorry for him, though. I mean, living in that tiny room, and right next to Orochimaru! I can barely put up with Sky-sama during missions! I can't even begin to imagine living in his room… Tobi's room will probably smell like snake, too.

Oro's shedding cycle is happening about now, isn't it? Poor Tobi… Well, at least Orochimaru gets hungry after he sheds. He shouldn't be functional for a few weeks after he eats.

.-..-..-.

Tobi is chunin-level. So much for getting a new member… Kiyo is helping him with his attacks, though. She would probably get Rei to do it, but I can't imagine Rei teaching anyone at Tobi's level anything without accidentally hurting them. He should be a decent fighter in a few years, give or take… it would actually be nice if he made it into the Akatsuki. That would prove that my synthetics are functional enough that I can experiment on someone and they can surpass jonin-level skills.

.-..-..-.

Chedo came home one day and reported that Kiyo was dead. So, we had to find her replacement because an evil organization with less than five people is pathetic and any one of us could get knocked off at any time. Tobi isn't strong enough yet.

A few months later, Zetsu came to us. Zetsu are odd, to say the least. One side is very dark green, one side very light green, with green hair and yellow eyes which have no pupils. They took the room directly across from Orochimaru's. Obviously, people had to be rearranged. Chedo is still the weakest of us, so obviously he can't fight alone.

Orochimaru has repaired himself with Rei-san to create an elite pair. I have been paired with Zetsu, which suits me very well because he works with plants and I work with puppets. Our styles don't conflict at all. Kakuzu has been paired with Chedone. Poor Kakuzu… he'd better look out for his limbs from now on.

I'm not paired with Orochimaru anymore.

You cannot begin, if you have never spent more than a day with him, to understand how happy this makes me. No more Orochimaru hitting on me, no more Orochimaru using my chakra strings as target practice for his tongue, and no more wondering if Orochimaru wants me as his next body. He might want Rei, but it's Zero-san who has to put up with the abuse now. This is the best thing that has ever happened to me in my entire life.

.-..-..-.

Chedo is dead, so this calls for another reorg. However, we now have more members: Hidan, who doesn't die; Deidara, an annoying sculptor who doesn't understand art; Nameless, who we know nothing about except that he hits on people as much as Orochimaru and is almost as strong as Rei, who is second only to Oro; and finally Kisame, who is half shark and has blue skin.

Oro and Rei are still paired together. Kisame has been paired with Nameless. Zetsu has been paired with Zetsu. I am paired with Deidara.

I despise the twerp for all he's worth.

This gives us nine members. To join the Akatsuki, you need an Akatsuki membership ring. There are ten rings. This means that Tobi has the potential to join the Akatsuki; however, that would mean that he would have to advance greatly in his fighting abilities. It's been over ten years now, so I don't think he really wants to be a member as much as he used to. I can understand that; Orochimaru does that to people.

Deidara, though. He uses powdered clay in his attacks. He moistens it with the mouths located on the palms of his hands – I would love to know how that works – and molds it into animals. Usually, he makes birds, and he can use ninjutsu to make them bigger (this provides a very convenient form of travel) but his views of art are all wrong. He believes it to be impermanent and all-consuming.

If not for great masterpieces, how would we even acknowledge art?

.-..-..-.

Tobi no longer has any chance of becoming Akatsuki.

Some kid killed off his clan, and considering that he defeated all of the Uchihas (except for Tobi, but that's a secret) he's very powerful. And very emo, but that's entirely beside the point. Orochimaru judged him worthy, so he's an Akatsuki member now. He's paired with Kisame now and White-san is paired with Zetsu. Unfortunately, I'm still paired with the long-haired idiot. Sometime, I should mix clay into his food. It would be very amusing if he were to blow up.

I made a new mask for Tobi; his old one is looking pretty beat-up. He says he likes orange, so it's an orange spiral, focused around the right eye. His right eye is more important, anyway – it's a sharingan, and his other eye is synthetic. The mask also has a cloth piece which covers his neck and the back of his head. He seems to like it.

.-..-..-.

Orochimaru has left, taking his ring with him. Rei is now leader, Zetsu have taken over Orochimaru's room (this means that the front hall doesn't smell bad anymore) and Tobi is now Zetsu's servant. He seems happy with that; I bet he would be grateful for anything after Orochimaru. At least Zetsu only joke. Their jokes are about eating humans, too, so Tobi has nothing to worry about.

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Sasori. Isn't it hilarious?

Next is Oro. Or Kiyo. Whoever I decide on. Kiyo has some interesting conversations with Sasori, doesn't she?

I love the "rechargeable batteries" line. Can't you just see that in your head?

Vote now! Do you want to see Kiyo or Orochimaru as the next chapter's focus?

It's so fun doing this type of fanfiction. You just copy-paste the conversations and you don't need to make up very much dialogue!


	3. Kiyo

Tobi

By Magewriter

Chapter 3: Kiyo

…Well, I've gotten one review so far (it's 7:32 on Monday, June 11, 2007) and so far there's a unanimous vote for Kiyo (haha, bad joke…)

Have a great, typo-free read!

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Sasori and Orochimaru were on a "mission" to visit Konoha.

We never expected the outcome.

"Kakuzu! Kiyo! Chedo! Rei! …We brought someone home with us!"

Sasori… he's really cute, even if he _is_ a puppet. So, I ran down the stairs two at a time and stopped just before I reached the door. I heard Chedo behind me.

"Orochimaru! Sasori! We weren't expecting you home for a few more hours!" Suddenly, I noticed the object that he was holding. It was a boy, bleeding heavily on his left side. "Oh, my gosh! What did you do to that cute little boy?!"

Orochimaru glared at me. "If we had done this to him, do you think we would have let him live? He's going to be one of Sasori's experiments."

"Sasori? Are you going to hurt him, Sasori? …Because then I would have to hurt you."

"I'm going to give him a left eye and make any other necessary repairs. If things don't work out so well, who knows? If he dies, I could cut him up and test my poisons on him, but I doubt that he's going to die."

I whacked him with my staff. "If you can't honor the dead or the near-dead, I don't think you have the right to kill!" Killing is okay, but inflicting unnecessary pain is what I consider to be cruel and definitely much worse than killing quickly.

"It would be honoring him. He would be fulfilling his duty to me as an experiment piece and be useful even after he was alive."

"How can you be so heartless?!"

"I took it out when I made myself into a puppet and gave it to Kakuzu. Now I have rechargeable batteries."

He walked past me, holding the boy. I hoped, for the child's sake, that he wouldn't die and get cut up to use as a test subject.

.-..-..-.

Sasori was at dinner. We didn't talk too much about the boy he had brought home, though. Rei, as usual, came down to get dinner and went right back up to his attic room.

Sometimes I worry that he'll forget how to talk if he stays up in his room for too long.

After dinner, I went to my room. I worked on my genjutsu until I was exhausted (I'm hopeless at genjutsu, but I'm also stubborn enough to keep trying), which was about 10:23. Then I fell asleep.

I woke up to human screams.

The scream seemed to be coming from Sasori's room. I ran in to see what was wrong.

The boy was lying on Sasori's worktable cradling his left eye in his hand. I rushed to him, pushing Sasori out of my way as I did so.

I put my hand on his shoulder. "It's okay, luvvy, it's going to be okay. You're going to be alright. Don't worry, sweetness, don't worry…"

I could see Sasori in my mind, glaring at me. But the boy was in pain. He began to sob and I bent a bit closer.

After he had stopped crying so hard, I stroked the side of his face. There's something about being in contact with other human beings that just makes people comfortable… He looked at me through his right eye. It was a sharingan. He looked embarrassed, but I just kept smiling at him and murmuring pet names to him.

Finally, he stopped crying.

I looked up at Sasori. "He should be okay. Oro-san will probably be mad at you for waking everyone up at two in the morning. But the boy will be fine. Don't do anything else to him for awhile, though."

"Who's the expert again?" He glared at me. Can't Sasori ever take advice without getting mad?

"I know. But I'm talking about emotional stress, not physical. Don't mess with his mind, okay, Sasori?"

"I know, I know. His body needs time to adjust to something like that. What should I do next?"

"Maybe the face. He seems really sweet… I'd like to know what he's saying. Plus, if he screams again, maybe it won't hurt so much." I looked at the boy again. "Are you okay?"

He nodded slightly and smiled through the tears.

I stood up. "Okay. Trust me – you'll feel better soon. Sasori's synthetic parts are the best in existence. Maybe it would be better if you got some sleep now. Sasori? Can you give him something to knock him out for awhile?"

"No, I need his brain to function normally so that it can connect to his eye."

Why does he have to say it like I'm an idiot? "Just… Try to fall asleep, okay?"

"Mmh." I think he nodded.

"Okay. G'night, Sasori. I know you're not entirely human, but your consciousness needs to rest too, so you should sleep or turn off or whatever it is you do sometime soon. Little boy, just do your best… I hope you like it here." He smiled at me and I left. How would I ever get a decent amount of sleep…?

.-..-..-.

That morning, Oro threw a fit. He was mad about the kid waking him up. Sasori wasn't at breakfast until really late, so he missed Oro entirely. Kakuzu and Chedo kept calling him rude names and making mean suggestions about his past.

Chedone left. Awhile later, Sasori came. When Sasori was done, he went back to his room. He yelled at Chedo to get out of his room, so I assumed that the boy was awake and got some rice and a piece of fish for him.

I put on my cheerful face and opened Sasori's door holding the rice bowl, chopsticks, and a glass of water. "Hey, Sasori! I brought the kid some food and stuff. Can he sit up?"

"Anyone can sit up if they're propped up enough." Wow. Amazing, Sasori. Way to give the functional answer without considering the little boy's feelings.

I put the food and water down and squatted next to the little boy. "Sweetness, do you think you can eat or drink something?"

"Mmh!" His head bobbed up and down.

"Okay. If I'm hurting you, just tell me. I'm going to help you sit up."

I propped him up against the wall and poured some of the water into the side of his mouth that didn't have blood dried over it. He seemed to relax; I guess he hadn't had anything to drink since he got here.

I turned around to look at Sasori, smiling my sweetest smile. It doesn't tend to affect him, but at least I can try! "Sasori, you really should work on his face next. He's too cute to be left like this – you can tell from the left side of his face." I turned back around and smiled at the luvvy.

"Give his eye time to adjust. I'm not going to do anything else on his head for awhile, either."

"Okay... Hey, sweetness, do you think you can eat rice and fish?"

"Mmh." He tried to pick up his chopsticks with his left hand and failed miserably.

"Oh, no, don't do that. You can't even hold them right. Why not his arm, Sasori?"

"I'll see what needs to be done." I could feel him glaring at the back of my head.

"Okay. You'll have everything back soon, sweetness. Don't worry."

As I helped him eat the food I'd brought him, Sasori felt around the left side of his body, assumedly for breaks and sprains and stuff. When he was done eating, Sasori kicked me out of his room. I went out into the hall and worked on my genjutsu.

After not-too-long, I heard my name in their conversation.

"Kiyo. She gets demonic when she's mad and trust me, when she's mad, she will not hesitate to kick you."

"You mean…?"

"Yes. As I said, she's dangerous. Once, she –"

I flung open his door and smiled wickedly, looking straight at the boy. "Oh, you mean the time with Chedo? That was hilarious! I mean, he was writhing in pain, but the rest of you…! Oh, man, you should have seen their faces, luvvy, it was hilarious!"

"His name is Tobi now."

"Oh? It suits him. 'Tobi.' You sure that was his name before?"

"Close enough." He glared at me.

"Well, I'll tell everyone. They've been calling you some pretty nasty names out there, Tobi."

"I can imagine." It was the first time I'd heard his voice. It was a cute as the rest of him.

"Not unless you know us, you don't. Did you tell him about us, Sasori?"

"Not yet."

"Okay. Tobi, there's something you need to know. Every person in this house – apart from you, of course – is an S-rank villain. We kill, injure, all that stuff, to achieve our goal of someday ruling the world. We're the freaks and the emo-kids – heck, with Oro as our leader, how could we not be weird?"

"Who _is_ Orochimaru? You haven't told me very much about him!"

I took on a more factual tone now. "Orochimaru is the leader of our organization – we call it the 'Akatsuki' – and he's part snake. He once did a forbidden jutsu, so now he can transfer his consciousness from one body to another. He's also sorta pervy – Chedo told me about some abuse he took once – so look out for him. And his tongue. It can stretch meters long and he has the ability to pick people up with it. And, I wouldn't argue with him if I were you because he's powerful enough to lead the Akatsuki."

"I'm afraid of this place now…"

"It's okay; he shouldn't be too interested in you. Unless he's one of those people who's into mismatched eyes… You shouldn't have any problems until your face heals, though."

"You don't have to be so mean…"

"I'm an S-class murderer, Tobi; I don't have to be nice."

"True."

"Kiyo, get out of my room. Who told you could come in in the first place?"

"No one. But I can tell when you're talking about me."

"No, you can't. That just means that you were practicing genjutsu in the hall and hoping that someone would help you with it because everyone knows you're hopeless with illusions and you happened to overhear us talking." Stupid Sasori… He knows me a little bit too well, if you ask me!

"Yeah. But it still means I was on this floor, which means that I knew something was going to happen up here."

"No, it means you wanted Chedo or Rei to help you because only Oro and Kakuzu are downstairs and Oro doesn't care about you because you're a woman."

"Shut up! At least I'm never going to be abused by him. You know women are better, anyway."

"It depends on your point of view. Now, get out of my room."

I glared at him and left. He closed the door because I didn't and he always has to have his door closed for some reason.

I continued working on my genjutsu.

.-..-..-.

Today, Tobi came to me with an interesting problem. You have to understand, at this point, that Tobi now wears a red and black mask, a shirt with long sleeves, and gloves. None of his skin is visible, except around his eyes.

"Kiyo-san? Can I talk to you?"

I was practicing with my staff, so I put it down. "Sure, Tobi-kun! Come on in!"

He did, closing the door behind him.

"Well, you saw my face when it was scabbed…"

"Sweetness, everyone saw your face when it was scabbed except for Rei-san. Everyone saw you when you were all bloody, too."

"Well, it's all healed…"

"Really? That's great!"

"No! It's healed, but I have all these hideous scars."

"It can't be that bad."

"Well, it is!"

"Really? Could I see your face then? Please?"

"Um… I don't want to."

I smiled at him. "If you're worried that I'll laugh or shrink back or make fun of you in any way, you're wrong. I wouldn't do that to someone. I'm not going to make you, but I really do want to see you."

"Why?"

"Because it's you. Before, you weren't the same person who you are now. It would be nice to know what the new Tobi looks like." And because at least one side of Tobi is adorable!

He paused for a moment, then reached up and took off his mask, exposing his face and neck. True, the right side of his face did look pretty bad, especially compared to the left side, but the scars also looked really cool.

"Now, do you want my opinion, Oro's opinion, or the general female population's opinion?"

"Which one is worst?"

"The women of the world."

"That one."

"You're ugly. You might be sort of cute, but the scars just… no. You want Oro next? That one's always important."

"Sure."

"I love the eyes, and you're cute, but the scars haven't gone away yet. Now do you want my opinion?"

"Okay."

"After hearing all that, our sweet little Tobi needs a hug." I like hugging people. It's fun! So I did. "Tobi will always be adorable. When you live with freaks for long enough, it starts to matter a little more who someone is rather than what they look like. I'll be there for you, Tobi."

"Thank you, Kiyo-san!"

We came out of the hug. "Now, to guess your age. You seem to be about… oh, twelve or thirteen. Which do you want to be?"

"I'll be twelve."

"Okay. Tobi is now twelve! You should probably go to Orochimaru soon – he's been waiting for you for half a month."

"But… You told me…"

"Do you honestly want him to be mad at you for avoiding him?" That would be worse…

"No, but I –"

"Then don't worry about it. He probably won't be attracted to someone wearing a mask anyway."

"Really?"

"Of course. Would you like a girl wearing a mask?"

"No…"

"Okay, then. I'll show you where his room is, okay? Follow me!"

He put his mask back on. I felt bad taking him to Orochimaru, but he had been here for two weeks, Sasori said that his eye was okay, and I would rather that I did something like this than someone like Sasori.

I knocked on the snake-man's door.

"Sky-sama, I have Tobi here. Should I bring him in?"

"Please."

I slid open the door. I had to push Tobi a bit to get him inside. The room smelled just as bad as always.

"Okay, Sky-sama, Tobi is yours now. Remember, he's not part snake like you. He can't stay in here for too long or his body overheats."

"Okay."

I left Tobi there then. Poor little Tobi… there wasn't really anything I could do, though.

.-..-..-.

This afternoon, we tested Tobi to see if he was Akatsuki material. He couldn't even best Chedone. Then, just for fun, I challenged Rei-san to a sparring match with customary Akatsuki rules. It ended when I threw him into the fence.

Never mess with a woman with a staff and a strong technique.

.-..-..-.

I have been entrusted with Tobi's training. I think they chose me because I'm the only Akatsuki member willing to put up with him for a long period of time.

Tobi is still chunin-level, so it's a bit mundane trying to teach him, but he's sweet and I don't mind his company. He hasn't even started using a personalized weapon yet… I'm not sure if he ever will at this rate. He seems to be having some trouble with ninjutsu, which is really too bad because ninjutsu are so much fun once you get used to them.

Chedo is teaching him genjutsu. Everyone knows that half of Chedo's flames are fake. It's figuring out which ones that will get you… And you have to avoid them before they hit you! I've been training with him for long enough that I know which ones are false. I wish someone would teach _me_ genjutsu.

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…Well, this wrote up pretty quickly. I guess I already had everything there… Next is Oro.

Witcher Co sair to go into future events.

If I could do that, I wouldn't have asked if I should make this a oneshot. There really isn't too much to get into after Tobi becomes Zetsu-s servant. I mean, he could talk about getting the first three tails, but that doesn't really apply too much to him. We haven't even seen him fight yet!

Don't you just love Kiyo?


	4. Orochimaru

Tobi

By Sheelos-lover

Chapter 4: Orochimaru

…So, I promised I'd get this chapter up this week. It's Thursday morning and I have until Saturday, so it shouldn't be TOO hard…

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Every once-in-awhile, I get the urge to check up on Konoha. Sure, I hate the people and despise them for all they're worth, but the buildings and the layout of the city itself are comforting to me. I grew up around them.

So, one morning, I approached his partner.

"Sasori-kun, will you go to Konoha with me?"

"Sky-sama, please don't sneak up on me like that. I could have chipped off too much of his arm. Do I have any sort of choice in this?"

"No."

"Then of course I'll go. When do we leave?"

"Why not now? We can be home before dinnertime."

"Okay." The puppet stood up and turned to face me. He's probably the most attractive of our organization beside myself.

We went through Konoha, my hometown, wearing fake headbands because a slashed leaf and slashed hourglass tend to cause suspicion, if you know what I mean…

On the way back – I hated to leave, but there's only so much you can see on the edges of Konoha and we had to stay there so that we could hide in the woods if anyone saw us – we heard people yell, then it merged into crying. They sounded young.

Because we had time, we went to investigate. There was a boy and a girl crying over another kid who had been crushed by a huge rock. The girl did an eye transplant, replacing the boy's eye with the eye of their teammate (I would assume that they were on a team together) but I didn't know why because I wasn't close enough. The two who were able left, both crying, but the boy with a sense of purpose.

For some reason, I wanted to help the kid. Maybe because he was so calm, so willing to take death without complaint. Maybe he would be good for the Akatsuki. "Should we save him, Sasori?"

"Why?"

"He looks so helpless… Let's save him."

"He could become a nuisance."

How to convince Sasori…

"If he's annoying, we can just make him forget us and send him back. Or we could kill him. It would be good practice with your synthetics, too – it doesn't look like the girl gave him a left eye after she took it out." There we go. Sasori always wants a chance to work with organic beings…

We shoved the rock off of him. "Shall we?" I asked. On the way home, we switched off carrying the kid. He was unconscious when we got him home. I was carrying him then. Fortunately, we weren't wearing our Akatsuki cloaks, so the blood stains that we got would be invisible.

They would have noticed that I was gone, if now Sasori, so I called out, "Kakuzu! Kiyo! Chedo! Rei! …We brought someone home with us!"

Kiyo came bounding down the stairs, Chedo behind her but taking them one step at a time. "Orochimaru! Sasori! We weren't expecting you home for a few more hours! Oh, my gosh! What did you do to that cute little boy?!"

"If we had done this to him, do you think we would have let him live? He's going to be one of Sasori's experiments."

"Sasori? Are you going to hurt him, Sasori? …Because then I would have to hurt you." She said it so innocently…

"I'm going to give him a left eye and make any other necessary repairs. If things don't work out so well, who knows? If he dies, I could cut him up and test my poisons on him, but I doubt that he's going to die."

She hit him on the head with her staff. Of course, he didn't flinch, in fact he wasn't really hurt by it, but he still doesn't like it when she does that. "If you can't honor the dead or the near-dead, I don't think you have the right to kill!"

"It would be honoring him. He would be fulfilling his duty to me as an experiment piece and be useful even after he was alive."

"How can you be so heartless?"

"I took it out when I made myself into a puppet and gave it to Kakuzu. Now I have rechargeable batteries."

…Well, Kakuzu certainly had five hearts…

I handed the boy to Sasori and went to the bathroom to clean the blood off my arms.

And that was the last of the boy that I heard that day.

At 1:54 the next morning, I was awoken by a scream, which turned into a series of screams, then sobbing, then lighter crying. Apparently the boy had woken up, and beyond a shadow of a doubt, Sasori had put in a new eye.

The problem was that it interfered with my sleep schedule.

It took awhile to get back to sleep. Whether you're in the Akatsuki or not, the human body has a subconscious reaction to screams, so I was awake for about a half-hour.

At a much more reasonable time that morning, I went to check on Sasori. Sometimes he powers himself down – he is centrally run by a false heart which spreads who-knows-what through his body, and that is powered by a rechargeable battery, so sometimes he plugs himself into the wall to "sleep." I noticed that he had been reading that book I had given him written by Jiraya. I unplugged him, pressed a few buttons that no one without prior knowledge would even know were buttons, and left him to turn on again.

At breakfast he was a little dazed and he was a tiny bit clumsy with his chopsticks, but that's to be expected after he recharges.

"…So, what was that last night?"

"What?"

"He gave the little boy a new eye, so the luvvy was screaming," Kiyo volunteered. She had always talked too much… "I helped calm him down. It looked really painful."

"You can't do work on the head without anesthetic," Kakuzu said. He was the best surgeon, generally, but Sasori did good work with more delicate or detailed things. Eyes were definitely under that category.

"So, where's the boy now? Hopefully not on your worktable…?"

"He's on a futon in my room. I don't think he should leave for awhile. He's pretty beat-up."

"Okay."

Chedo announced that he was leaving, and soon after Sasori yelled at him to get out of his room. Kiyo muttered something about how Sasori was ignoring the "sweetness'" human needs and got a bowl, some rice, v and a piece of the fish that Chedone had cooked that morning.

I went to my room to read my current novel.

.-..-..-.

It's been two weeks since the boy came here. He's been walking around and socializing for awhile, but today he comes into my service. He'll be staying in the room that's connected to mine – not much more than a closet, actually, but he doesn't have much stuff to put in it in the first place – and he will act as my servant.

Over these two weeks, the boy has gotten into the habit of wearing normal Akatsuki pants and tabi, but also a long-sleeved shirt, gloves, and a black mask.

I heard Kiyo outside my door.

"Sky-sama, I have Tobi here. Should I bring him in?"

"Please."

She opened my door and nudged the boy – Tobi – inside. He looked intimidated just by the heat and smell of my room.

I like the smell of my room. It smells like me.

"Okay, Sky-sama, Tobi is yours now. Remember, he's not part snake like you. He can't stay in here for too long or his body overheats."

"Okay." I knew that already…

Kiyo left and I showed Tobi to his room. He got his futon from Sasori's room, dragged it into his closet, and opened his window as wide as it would go.

Apparently, he doesn't like the way I smell.

I don't blame him for wanting it to be cooler in there, though; normal humans react negatively to the temperature of my room.

.-..-..-.

Today, Tobi fought Chedone, the weakest of us, and lost very quickly. He's barely chunin level. The, for sport, Kiyo and Zero (who won't tell us his name) fought. Of course, Zero won, but Kiyo did a pretty good job against him.

Partway through the match – I don't know how it ended, but Kiyo never wins to Rei – I left. I had that itchy feeling that meant I was going to shed. I don't shed for size, like most snake-based creatures, but it still happens.

The hardest part for a humanoid to shed is the back, so I had the boy help me with that skin. It all happens very quickly… Then he ran off. When I came upstairs, he was eating lunch.

"Heya, Oro-san! …You look like you just shed." Kiyo… Why must you think of my snakelike tendencies as disgusting.

"Yes. Do you have a problem with that?"

"No! Not at all! …It's just that sometimes, after you shed, there are little flakes of snakeskin everywhere."

"I waited until pretty late this time; it mostly came off in big pieces."

"Awesome."

There was still something… off… about her face. "Is there something else?"

"…Well, I was just wondering if that was why To-chan here was so freaked out."

"I – I didn't mean to impose by worrying her! Honestly, I didn't!"

"It's okay. You'll get used to it."

His eyes got wider.

"Don't worry, To-chan," Kiyo whispered. "You'll be fine."

…Or maybe not. It depends on what he considers "fine." He seems like he might be pretty cute under that mask…

.-..-..-.

Kiyo is dead. It doesn't seem horrible or anything; she died for a cause she believed in. She was a girl, too, so I really wasn't that torn up. Chedo is upset, though; when he's not in his room, he's moping around. He and Kiyo were pretty close.

However Chedone feels, though, we need a new member. There are only five of us…

.-..-..-.

We've found Zetsu! Zetsu are two people and a plant; one side is black, one side is white, they each have their own personality, and they have a venus flytrap-like-thing around their head. This calls for a huge reorg.

So, I've paired myself with Zero instead of Saso-kun, but he's paired with Zetsu. Chedo is paired with Kakuzu. Sasori and Zetsu seem happy. Zero never seems happy, but he's relatively content, which still doesn't mean much because it could all be an act… Chedo is still a little upset over Kiyo, but he and Kakuzu are doing okay together… hopefully, no one will die and we won't have to reorganize again.

.-..-..-.

…But, of course, nothing lasts forever. Chedo died recently, but we've also acquired a few members: Hidan, Deidara, White-kun, and Kisame. They all came at around the same time.

White-kun is really cute. His voice isn't too deep and he has very nice hair, pretty eyes, and smooth skin. He never takes off his cloak, but he seems like the sort of person who would have a very slender figure. In other words, he's perfect.

I don't want people to talk about me, so I kept Zero for this reorg. I also wouldn't want him to think that I don't think he's cute… Kisame and White-kun are paired, Saso-kun and Deidara, Kakuzu and Hidan, and Zetsu.

Rei works well with me. White-kun can work well with just about anyone… Sasori hates Deidara, who acts a lot like Chedone in that he's cheerful and easily excitable. He's cute, too. Kakuzu and Hidan argue a lot, but I think they could be friends. Zetsu, of course, have no complaints…

Why is it that I suddenly find myself surrounded by cute boys? There's To-chan, who still works as my servant, Rei-kun, Hidan, White-kun, Saso-kun, Dei-chan… Kakuzu, Zetsu, and Kisame don't do anything for me, but still, that's over half of the people in the Akatsuki.

Tobi trained with Kiyo, and he hasn't done much since she died. What he does do is better than when he started, but still… Right now, he has only a very slight chance of becoming Akatsuki.

.-..-..-.

The Akatsuki is getting… Well, boring. I'm thinking of leaving.

.-..-..-.

Itachi.

Itachi is hotter than the sun.

And he has a sharingan.

I want his body.

He has the mangekyo, too, which would definitely be an advantage. Now, how to get close to him…

.-..-..-.

I can't get Itachi. So, I'm leaving the Akatsuki. Apart from trying to get Itachi, it's boring here. Except that Itachi lobbed off my left hand. So, I'm taking it with me. I'm going to conquer the Land of Rice Fields and start my own village, and this impudent little organization can do without one of its precious rings.

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I read the Wikipedia article on Orochimaru and I found out that I'd gotten some stuff wrong. For one thing, in Chapter 2 I forgot to put in that Kakuzu and Hidan were paired, but that could have just been assumed… And I found out that Orochimaru had actually tried to get Itachi's body (the official reason is that he wanted the sharingan, but…) so I changed around the order of events a bit. Sorry about that! Really, really, really sorry! I hate inconsistencies!

I promised this by Saturday. And It's Friday now. So, I'm ahead of schedule. And Pocky-machine isn't back yet, so I'm off to work on "Ikachi."


End file.
